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Factoids about the 2012 Hall of Fame Candidates

Monday afternoon will see the announcement of the latest addition to the Baseball Hall of Fame. In order to impress your friends around the water cooler on Monday morning, here are some fun facts for each of the eligible players:

Barry Larkin: Larkin just missed some wonderful round number milestones. He had a .295 career batting average with 198 HRs, 960 RBI and 379 SBs. Nonetheless, there are only three players in history with at least a .295 average, 195 homers, 950 ribbies and 375 stolen bases: Barry Bonds, Roberto Alomar and Paul Molitor. Two of those are already in the Hall and Mr. Bonds well . . .

Lee Smith: Smith has probably gotten sick from riding the HOF “Ballot Rollercoaster” since his initial eligibility in 2003. Here is his percentage of ballots in each year: 42.3%, 36.6%, 38.8%, 45.0%, 39.8%, 43.3%, 44.5%, 47.3%, 45.3%. He DID make six starts (out of 1,022 appearances) in his career. In his first start, he pitched six innings in what would be a 2-1 loss to the Phillies in the last game of the 1981 regular season (the split-season brought on by the mid-season strike).

Tim Raines: Raines stole at least 70 bases in six consecutive seasons (1981-86). His percentage for that period: 86.9. He had 2,605 hits (tied for 76th all-time) despite never having a 200-hit season.

Edgar Martinez: One of the best (and most “clutch”, if you’ll pardon the use of that word) hitters of his generation. For his career, he hit .375/.441/.602 with a runner on third and less than two out. His .479 OBP in 1995 is one of the eight highest in the expansion era. Cousin of Carmelo Martinez, whose own claim to fame was that he fielded Pete Rose’s 4,192nd hit in left field on 9/11/1985.

Dale Murphy: From 2003 to 2011, his ballot percentage not been lower than 8.5% or higher than 13.8%. From 1976-1987 (age 31 season): 132 OPS+, 1988-1993 (age 37 season): 96 OPS+, with his slugging percentage never higher than .421.

Javy Lopez: His first agent’s name was Chuck Berry (wonder if he said “Javy be good!”). He was successful in only 8 out of 27 career stolen base attempts (3 out of 19 if you exclude going 5 out of 8 in 1998). There actually have been three other players with eight or fewer successful steals in 27 or more lifetime attempts.

Ruben Sierra: Sierra had 13 doubles, 10 triples and 16 homers in his first season in the Majors (1986, when he had only 411 plate appearances). This was the first time a player had reached double digits in all three categories in his first season since 1961, and it hasn’t been done since. He wore 12 different uniform numbers during his big league career.

Jeromy Burnitz: The only player named Jeromy in Major League history. He was part of one of the most complicated trades in recent history . . . a 3-team, 11-player swap:

Eric Young: Good news: he stole 465 bases in his career. Bad news: he was caught 168 times (73.4% success rate). Only four other players have stolen fewer bases while being caught as many times as Young.

Brad Radke: Only once in his 12 seasons did he pitch fewer than 162 innings. From 1996-2001, he started 202 games and pitched 1356.2 innings. He surrendered more homers than walks in both 2003 and 2005.